Eclipse… Saturday August 16th, 2008

e·clipse (-klps)
n.
1.
a. The partial or complete obscuring, relative to a designated observer, of one celestial body by another.
b. The period of time during which such an obscuration occurs.
2. A temporary or permanent dimming or cutting off of light.

I’m jumping across time with this one, because I’m going back to an eclipse gone-by as a result of an eclipse this very night. And because I’m a word nerd, I thought I’d throw in some definitive perspective… (probably also because I’m a nerd for definitive perspective, in those brief moments when she raises her pretty head).

I was at Sziget, that magical Hungarian island home of music festival goodness. Sziget 2008 marked my third in three years, and I can honestly tell you my desire for completing that hatrick was one of the things that got me through some challenging travel times of that year.

Much of the crew I was with that year had been before, but amongst the new faces was my friend Imogen and her daughter/my friend Cohen. Coh was something of my festival partner in crime that week, and this day we ventured in early together through the sweltering Hungarian summer heat, wandered theatre stages, chatted calming chatter, drank coffee, chilled…

Sziget is as much theatre as it is disco, as much chill-out as it is go-hard. Sziget is what you make of it. Sziget, my friends, is all things. And this year, Sziget was proving a touch tough for lil ol’ me.

b. The period of time during which such an obscuration occurs.

See, emotional pain can be as obscuring as any celestial being… if not more so, one might suggest. I found or created or encountered (or all three?!) some emotional pain on that island that year, and as is so often the case, the phases of the moon (and the buckets of long island iced tea) had a way of highlighting it…

But I was never sad this day... I was overwhelmed. I was delusional. I was reverberating with good and bad and beauty and fear. But I was never sad.

Who can be sad when there’s Vietnamese Water Puppet theatre, and the New York SKA Jazz Ensemble, and Roisin Murphy (with her honestly perfect boobs!), and Maceo Parker?!

Oh Maceo, where had you been all my life?? When did jazz hit so deep and put such a smile on my face that my cheeks hurt, such bounce in my feet that I dance til I’m dripping?!

And after Maceo’s set, in the soft enveloping black warmth of a Hungarian summer night, I literally watch the lunar eclipse above me... See the light of the moon phase away and back again above me, with the return of its rays beaming as cool and bright as the sun might warm and strong…

Tonight in Melbourne there’s another full moon and lunar eclipse. They don’t come along so often, and I nearly always find something significant goes down at that time. But tonight’s forecast for Rebecca promises to be quiet and relaxed… I wonder what she really has in store for me…

Actually now

In a complete diversion from the whole premise of this blog, I'm going to actually write about today...

Today is the fifteenth of June, 2010.

Today was the recovery BBQ of a wedding I MC'ed on the eleventh. I was tired. I was fairly hungover. I struggled. I can't lie; I nearly didn't make it. But I got there and I'm glad I did; as awesome as the wedding was, today was the day to be there for our bride and groom when they could relax and enjoy.

But the reason I want to talk about "actually now" is that I'm going home - I'm going back to Europe. Tomorrow. Wow.

And it occurs to me that I'm almost as nervous as I am excited. Not nervous for all those logistical maybes that can go wrong; nervous to catch a glimpse of myself through the eyes of the great friends I'll see there, and see who I am today compared to then.

I went corporate. The lil bit fat, relaxed open gypsy settled back into her suits and worked like crazy for the last eighteen months. And I proper enjoyed it. But that's ended now, and being presented with the opportunity to take the break abroad, it seemed a sound decision - obligations aside.

So Wednesday I'll arrive in the city I called home for more time than any other outside of Melbourne; Amsterdam. I'm over people thinking that those of us who know and love Amsterdam only love her for "the green" - I'll go on the record here and now to say I don't smoke, I've never done so, and it doesn't suit me in the slightest. But this city is so much more than redlights and coffee shops - it's art, freedom, intelligence. It's a strangely cramped lil city that feels like the bookshelf of a dusty library, crammed tight with too many books so that they can't stand up straight. It's more comforting than I ever imagined it could be.

Because there I will find some friends who I've never lost, but almost constantly missed. And I'm curious to see them, and have them see me. As I said, excited and nervous in almost equal measure.

But it's time to bring together the hardworking professional that Melbourne has seen for the last couple of years, and the vagabond gypsy that came before her. It's time to stand those two women in the same room within me, and see where the dust settles. It's time to be with my people.

Two years ago today...

21st May, 2008

I don't even know what this day was yet - haven't checked the trusty nokia diary - but I feel like writing so writing has begun...

This day two years ago saw the end of my two weeks traveling Spain with a beautiful friend of mine from back home. We were in Barcelona, which he would make his base for the subsequent summer, and I would fly off to here n there as my gypsy summer continued.

Thing is with this boy, though I love him so incredibly much it's with with nothing but love that I say it - he's difficult. OK OK I don't help things, but he is.

And isn't it funny how the end of something is so often the most difficult time?! Even something as lovely as this lil jaunt together had been. So often it's the closing moments of something that brings emotion and vulnerability to the surface - where it firmly overtakes anything like logic or sanity ;-)

I've been thinking lately - as in over these last days - how the humdrum of daily life masks the impact of existential crises that travel brings up. The good ones, the bad ones... though this day two years ago wasn't that, and oddly this day today might be - so it seems I've just contradicted myself... Anyhow, moving on. Or back. Ahh whatever...

So two years ago today I was wandering the streets of Barcelona, essentially avoiding my beautiful but moody friend because the ending of our trip had brought us to the edge of our nerves for each other.

Instead I played with a spunky lil Argentinian pocket-rocket named Cici - we escaped the hostel for a lil piazza (Italian I know, but how I call them) and talked girly talk like body image and boys. It was awesome. It was an antidote to two weeks of boy time where he and i had both probably felt almost everything, but said absolutely nothing ;-)

Cici gave me a parting gift - a little anklet with bells on, that were legend to be the sound of tiny guardian angels to take care of me. I wore it for a long time after and still have it.

THIS is the stuff that matters.. these moments in piazzas with distant friends who invest in you the kind of faith you just need to hear every now and then. THESE are the times we should all remember and focus on - these tiny lil innocuous moments with the smell of a foreign city in your lungs and strange singing accents in your ears. THAT is the stuff I am focusing on today - as in this day right here.. it isn't much, but it helps :-)

Homecomings...

26 August 2008

I don’t mean to sound wanky when I say that by this date, I had seen a fair few places. Such is my nature that I’d found amazing things in almost every single one of those places.

I don’t mean to sound whingy when I say that by this date, I was actually quite tired. Such is my nature that I’d effectively exhausted myself on this adventure, relentlessly sucking everything I could out of every experience – people, cities, nights out, train rides – nothing escapes the intensity of the way I do stuff, for better or for worse.

My trip had taken on a strange energy; as grateful as I felt for the few months I had left to travel, I was also quite deliberately ‘dancing out the set’ – forcing myself to make the most out of my limited time, but actually dragging my feet through it too. I’d literally been counting the days between then and my touchdown at Tullamarine.

Then, I got to Porto.

What that city held for me could fill a dozen additional posts (and possibly will, if I ever commit to this poor neglected blog), but for the first part let me leave aside the connections I found in the amazing people, and just talk about how that one moment felt when I arrived.

Porto is nestled quite dramatically across the side of a hill above the River Duoro in the north of Portugal. The train up from Lisbon, my chosen path for this day, arrives across a bridge that traverses from the top of the south hillside to Porto on the other, with the full drop to the river below visible to passengers as it does so.

So there I was, one tired dirty suntanned lil Aussie traveller, pack on ready to alight the train. There I was, ready to find another tourist office, another map, another hostel, another group of travellers to talk to. Ready to man up and summon the energy to do all those things in yet another city, to trudge through it as best I could, and enjoy what this city had for me.

But as I saw that river, that city, something in me changed. I literally froze and chills ran up the length of my body. I could swear to you I had goosebumps, though there is a chance I’m exaggerating on that fact.

I’m not exaggerating this though – the moment I looked down that river at the sprawling brick houses, the rising church towers, the blue glistening Duoro, I literally said out loud to myself “Oh f$*k, I’m in all sorts of trouble.”

Trouble because something in me knew right then that I would never want to leave. Trouble because as tired as I was, and as much as Australia is my home, it was going to hurt to get to know this beautiful city and then have to leave her behind. Trouble because I had found this somewhere over the rainbow, right when I thought I was too out of breath to appreciate her.

Turns out it was easy to appreciate Porto. Turns out everything about my time there was easy – the company, the Super Bock, the food, even stumbling home up her cruelly hilly streets at 7am.

The illogical elements of life are the bits I love best. It’s completely illogical, my love for this city, but I knew right then that in some strange way, I was Home.

Since one year...

It’s exactly one year today since I landed back home. This is an attempt to write my way around this feeling that I have been so struggling to articulate today, purely self-indulgent and certainly of no real worth to anyone but me. You have been warned.

I keep a short diary of every day, locked into my mobile phone calendar and heaven forbid should any curious cab driver ever unearth it the day I finally lose my phone on a bender. The premise of this blog (such lofty ideals) was to use that as my basis for these entries.
My entry from that day doesn’t reveal much – I watched Heroes on the plane, sat by an Irish woman and got the short line at customs.

My memory from that day doesn’t reveal much more…

I remember my arm was broken. I remember leaving Schipol Airport in Amsterdam the day before, and being in an utter state of shock, but that would be the entry for the 29th October, not the 30th. I remember so much from my trip, but so little of this day.

Why is it then that this anniversary has me so spun sideways?

Initially I thought it was the circumstances of today that were hitting me, but as the day wears on I think that less and less. It doesn’t help that coincidentally my parents arrived in Amsterdam yesterday, welcomed by my Dutch Angels who’d kissed me goodbye exactly one year ago to that day. The universe is a perverse lil bitch sometimes, she really is.

The whole thing has made me very reflective – on who I am now, who I was then, and certainly on who I was way back when I originally flew out near-on three years before. The mind is quite literally boggling, though externally perhaps I seem pretty much the same.

I feel wiser, tireder, stronger, more secure and not a little jaded. It’s this last one that doesn’t sit with me, as anyone who knows me would be unsurprised to learn. My optimism is so all embracing it’s almost dangerous, and is something of which I am quite proud.

Do we have to become more jaded as we mature? Is it a maturation necessity to surrender not just our youthful energy, but also our youthful enthusiasm and naivety? God knows I am willingly going down kicking and screaming on all three fronts, but going down I am.

I’m getting older, wiser, smarter and if I do say so, hotter. I like getting older, and enjoy my own company and my life more for each year I dance / stumble / power my way through. But these milestones and their consequent reflection is a bit nasty these days…

Maybe coz we are by definition running out of them?... Yeah, maybe.

Maybe coz I am honestly still lying to myself and I DON’T like my life, my job, my mind, my body?… Lol methinks nup on that one.

I do miss my gypsy life, but it’s missing the people that makes being home cruel. I miss them all so much it is like a physical pain some days, and consequently I literally shut my mind to it momentarily just so I can appreciate the present.

Of course they are all always in my heart. I have been so incredibly blessed for people in my life. People who have believed in me, trusted me, challenged me, hurt me, loved me, shit me to tears.. on this side of the globe and the other.

But I miss them every day, so I don’t think that’s what is getting to me today.
I quote Lucas… “What’s with today today?”

F*ed if I know kids… Sometimes we just gotta ride them out I guess.

Happy Anniversary to myself. From myself. Bring on tomorrow.

Peaches 'n' Cream..

There's no day for this one. There's no day, but there is a man. And a family. And a song. And a smell.

For some reason today, this humble 'nothing' Friday in Melbourne, I got to be thinking about how some songs have a very distinct smell for me.

Yup, smell.

Yup, I'm insane ;-)

For example, The Killers Mr Brightside smells like an Italian Summer - but that's for another post. The example for this post is Peaches 'n' Cream by John Butler Trio, and how it smells like the Victorian surf coast. Like Home.

But here's the contridiction - it might smell like the surf coast, but it creates a full-fleshed, three dimentional vision of Amsterdam... of my brother Samy... standing in our Flying Pig bar (most probably arm in arm)...



See this wonderful contridictory vision is born of countless nights, days and afternoons where Samy would play me this song. He would fix those deep, intense brother Samy eyes on me, and play me this song. We would sing along together, and my brother Samy would break my poor lil heart there and then - in such sweet ways.

And for all those times when Sam played me this song.. and how I craved and ACHED for this place called home!!.. I stood there in those soft warm walls of that hostel called home, and LONGED for the smell of this other place called home....

Funny how now I listed to this song and long for the flip side of the coin ;-)

Not that I am unsatisfied... not wholly at least.. mostly I am just entertained at my own human nature...

And inspired by the magic of the love of all that we - the 'dam family - found in Amsterdam. It doesn't fade. On the contrary - the more days I live, the older (wiser?!) I get, the more real and beautiful and amazing that Amsterdam family is.

........."there you are... right in front of me.... a brand new day.... sunrise over sea.... no longer, my cup half-empty... coz there you are".......

So much love, guys... Peaches 'n' Cream, and so much love xox

L’Amour Menacant

Sometime in November or December, 2006

Shortly after arriving in Amsterdam, realising I would live largely broke and cold, I invested in a “Museumkaart” – a membership card for Amsterdam’s museums, purchased so that I would have worthwhile entertainment on cold days off when I couldn’t walk in parks.

So we find me, some cold day or another, heading off for the Rijksmuseum… it was just around the corner from work at the Flying Pig, and touted as one of Amsterdam’s finest.

After an entire ground floor of (slightly boring) Dutch empirical paintings of sailboats and bloodshed, I climbed a curving flight of softly polished wooden stairs, and found “L’Amour Menacant”.

I have always preferred sculpture (or photography) to most other art, and this sculpture is an example of one that stopped me dead in my tracks. In the foyer at the top of the stairs I saw this, and PLEASE believe me when I tell you that the picture you are looking at attached to this blog does NOT do it justice.

As soon as I saw it, with outright clarity and a hard beating heart, I thought to myself “oh fuck, that’s the whole fucken point”. And though the realisation challenged me, I thought it happily… especially once I read the encryption on the base.

Here I was, standing staring at a clearly mischievous lil fucker (ie Cupid) ready to reek havoc on all our lives (ie inflict us with Love, god forbid) and I read inscribed on the base the Latin that translates to…. “Whoever you are, I am your master. That I am. That I was. That I will always be.”

And I shit you not, my skin rippled with goosebumps and my heart kinda froze.

It’s a funny thing, the way the Universe chooses to have its way with us on days like this. See, when I arrived at the Rijksmuseum that day, I remember quite clearly selecting Kruder and Dorfmeister’s Sessions 1 & 2 as my soundtrack for the day (drowning out tourists in museums is highly recommended, most especially when you are one of them), but bear with me as to the point…

My friend James has (arguably) been with me through more analysis of Love and Its Great Purpose than any other individual in my life. K&D is irrefutably his soundtrack for me, so before I ever even saw L’Amour Menacant (“Menacing Cupid” it translates to, by the way) he was standing right beside me despite the fact he was actually safely tucked up in Melbourne on the opposite side of the globe at the time.

Lately (as in actually these most recent days and months of my life ‘lately’), I had been craving An Epiphany. This day I am attempting to describe right now was most definitely one.

Coz see there I stood, before this grinning lil fucker (Cupid), with his wry grin that positively screamed “I am about to fuck up your life in ways you never imagined”, and I said to myself all over again with clarity and knowing I had never before experienced – “It’s the whole fucken point.”

Love. Surrender. Surrendering to love. It’s the whole fucken point.

We may like to occupy ourselves and our days with concerns about rent and jobs and superannuation and so on and on and on… but when all that meaningless discourse dies down, and we are left with the actual point for our lives, we find Love.

And staring open-mouthed at L’Amour Menacant made me realise the need – the beauty! – of surrendering to it, to Love.

So, since James was as close to my oracle for this shit as it gets, and he had been with me this day from the outset, I went and bought a postcard featuring the image of cheeky lil Menacing Cupid and filled it with cramped handwriting about theories, fears and beliefs… I tried to capture for him the burning moment of that Epiphany. And I kissed it, and sent it his way.

There is more to say about L’Amour Menacant – about how art intellectuals believe that the artist (Etinenne Falconet) was referring to the Egyptian god Horus when he sculpted Cupid’s fingers to his lips (I have the eye of Horus tattooed on my back, for those who don’t know) – but I think this is enough meaningful Epiphany for one blog, don’t you?!

xox